Red Bull’s Max Verstappen produced a stunning drive in challenging conditions, charging from the back of the field to finish second at the 2026 F1 São Paulo GP. It marked the third consecutive race at Interlagos in which Verstappen had started towards the back of the grid and recovered to finish on the podium. The result also extended his streak to eight consecutive podium finishes this season.
Starting 21st following grid penalties, Verstappen did not have the easiest start to the race. The Dutchman admitted that a mistake with the clutch had compromised his getaway, leaving him with work to do in the opening corners.
“To be honest, I had a very slow reaction time off the line because I was holding the clutch wrong. So I had to very quickly react, and then I was slow off the line. And so that was my mistake.”
“I was just flying by cars almost every corner”
Despite his difficult start, Verstappen quickly found his rhythm and began making his way through the field. However, traffic in the opening corners initially prevented him from making the progress he had hoped for, particularly compared to Lewis Hamilton. Once he found clear opportunities to overtake, the Red Bull driver was able to take advantage of his superior grip.
“But then I just got a bit unlucky in the first three corners, where it was just like a traffic jam, like three or four cars in front blocking basically how much I could pass. And actually, Lewis had a very good first lap. He could really get through those cars. So I was a little bit disappointed that I couldn’t make the same headway.
“But then, within two laps, I was just flying by cars almost every corner. So yeah, we had a lot more grip, I guess, than most in the midfield. I don’t know what lap I was in the top 10, but it just all happened actually very quickly.”
Verstappen overtook 10 cars on the lead lap, entered the points by Lap 3 and climbed all the way to second before making his first pit stop on Lap 17. However, as the track began to dry and the field switched to slick tyres, Verstappen’s race became considerably more difficult.
Harder to handle in the dry
Although Verstappen had shown impressive pace in the wet conditions, the switch to slick tyres exposed unexpected handling problems with his RB22. The Dutchman struggled with significant oversteer through the high-speed corners, leaving him unable to extract the same performance from the car.
Reflecting on the difficulties, Verstappen suggested that Red Bull would need to investigate whether an underlying issue had affected the car’s performance.
“As soon as I switched to the slicks, I had some extreme amount of oversteer in the car in the high-speed corners, which made it super difficult to drive. So we need to understand if something broke on the car, some kind of aero loss or whatever, because this was not normal.
“So I sit here, of course, very happy with second. But at the same time, I knew, or I know, there was more in it if the car would have been in good shape.”
Nevertheless, Verstappen managed to keep his car pointing in the right direction despite the challenging handling characteristics. He moved ahead of teammate Isack Hadjar into second on Lap 38 and maintained the position through what appeared to be the final round of pit stops.
However, the rain returned in the closing stages, forcing Verstappen to switch back to intermediate tyres on Lap 63. Despite returning to the compound on which he had been so competitive earlier in the race, the change in conditions did little to resolve his handling difficulties.
“We can still learn a lot about the car” through the final races
Verstappen acknowledged that the wet conditions had provided additional overtaking opportunities, allowing him to experiment with different racing lines as he worked his way through the field. However, he remained concerned about the dramatic change in his car’s behaviour following the first pit stop, particularly as the issues persisted even after he returned to intermediate tyres.
“In the wet, it’s probably also—it gives you a few more opportunities to get by cars. And you can do some different lines and more opportunities. So that definitely helped me today.
“But we also have to understand why or what went wrong with the car as soon as we went to the slick tyres. Because even when I switched back to the inter tyres at the end, the car was like night and day different to my first stint, which shows that there is something wrong.”
Despite those difficulties, Verstappen was pleased to secure another podium and valuable championship points for Red Bull. With the 2026 F1 São Paulo GP behind them, the team now turns its attention to the next round in Las Vegas and the remaining races of the season.
Verstappen hopes that Red Bull can use the final rounds to better understand the car’s performance and carry those lessons into its preparations for 2027.
“Happy to be able to score a good amount of points for the team. We needed it also for the constructors. And I hope now, of course, it sets us up for a nice ending of the season where, yeah, we can still learn a lot about the car that we need to implement also in next year’s car.”
